Ahh, those medical machines and advanced technologies only benefit the rich anyway. And you thought Obama million man math was just for the unemployment ruse! Ha!

Delicious irony. excerpt: Obama just may have lost the election. The president signed off on a Health and Human Services ruling that says that under ObamaCare, Catholic institutions-including charities, hospitals and schools-will be required by law, for the first time ever, to provide and pay for insurance coverage that includes contraceptives, abortion-inducing drugs and sterilization procedures. If they do not, they will face ruinous fines in the millions of dollars. Or they can always go out of business. In other words, the Catholic Church was told this week that its institutions can't be Catholic anymore. This is in fact a potentially unifying moment for American Catholics, long split left, right and center. Catholic conservatives will immediately and fully oppose the administration's decision. But Catholic liberals, who feel embarrassed and undercut, have also come out in opposition. The church is split on many things. But do Catholics in the pews want the government telling their church to contravene its beliefs? A president affronting the leadership of the church, and blithely threatening its great institutions? No, they don't want that. They will unite against that. The smallest part of this story is political. There are 77.7 million Catholics in the United States. In 2008 they made up 27% of the electorate, about 35 million people. Mr. Obama carried the Catholic vote, 54% to 45%. They helped him win. They won't this year. And guess where a lot of Catholics live? In the battleground states. There was no reason to pick this fight. It reflects political incompetence on a scale so great as to make Mitt Romney's gaffes a little bitty thing. There was nothing for the president to gain, except, perhaps, the pleasure of making a great church bow to him. Enjoy it while you can. You have awakened a sleeping giant.

Excellent white board illustrated discussion on capitalism and the financial crisis.   I have a question though?  How do you discuss capitalism without also discussing borrowing, interest rates and dividends?  Seriously.  No mention of interest rates?  No mention of the relationship between GOLD, commodities and fiat money?   Yes, the Banksters collapsed the world economy with the willing consent of corrupt crony politicians.   The corruption and practice of crony corporatism is NOT Capitalism!  It's fascism.   Nor are the bailouts of the Banksters and big unions capitalism!  In capitalism there is no such thing as a government bailout or two big too fail.  Capitalism would have put the Banksters into the dirt without blinking. There is an interesting transection where the cartoonist suggest that global corporatism demanded capital from creative financiers.  And that caused the the problem.  Seems the Banksters got too too creative. I disagree with this perspective, and am left wondering how the connection between global commerce and creative "casino" financial instruments are natural consequences of each other?  It's a commonly held belief that global explosion was due to the a Reagan - Thatcher conservative revolution where one of the key corporate organizing principles was that of the "franchise" backed by IPO style public stock offerings.  Clowns like Warren Buffett gobbled up tons of Coca Cola and McDonalds stock, waiting for global trade barriers to fall in the wake of Reagan - Thatcher liberty.  When the Soviet Union collapsed, the "walls" truly did come down.  And USA corporations were uniquely positioned and structured to roll out globally. That doesn't have anything to do with the kind of creative casino gambling that brought the world to it's knees.  What do exotic financial derivatives have to do with funding corporations?  Yes, they were used to hedge financial positions as sovereign governments were maddeningly borrowing and s

Ever wonder about the difference between Libertarians and Conservatives?  How about Libertarians and Liberal Socialist?  This quick Libertarian FAQ does an excellent job describing Libertarianism and contrasting it with other political-moral-econmomic belief systems.

Throw the socialist out!  The full video of Col. Allan West's speech at the Lincoln Day Dinner in West Palm Beach Florida.  Incredible and well worth your time.  You will want to stand up and cheer.   Left lengthy note in the new Diigo Quick Note.  Wish i could do the same with EverNote!!!  Quick note is okay.  Very convenient, but no tags, groups or lists.  And the only HTML-Rich Text editing is at Diigo where you can edit a QuickNote.  No bookmarking either with QuickNote either.  Hopefully Diigo users will persuade QucikNote to improve this useful product.  And hopefully EverNote will come to see the advantages of Diigo. Need to edit the QuickNote with some quick definitions of the isms: Conservatism, the ,any Socialisms, Fascism, Nazism, Communism, Obammunism and libertarianism. My QuickNote discusses three corners: Libertarianism, Socialism and Fascism. Some quick comments:  Libertarianism differs from Conservatism in that conservatives champion conservative-judeo-christian social values.  The kind you think of when you hear God, Country, Community and Family.  The Libertarian champions the founding documents; the Declaration and the Constitution.  Here the only "value" the founding fathers desired to be embedded in the governing structure was that of "individual liberty".  Making the governing structure a Republic focused entirely on the objective of "ordered liberty". socialist are also focused on social values, but their primary objective is the welfare of the group.  More often than not, the individual's liberty is sacrificed to the welfare of the group.  In fact, in knee jerk socialism, the individual only exist to benefit the greater society.  When the individual becomes a drag, euthanasia is the tool of choice for a socialist.  Not though that as long as the individual is a voting and consuming member of the group that is overturning the Constitutional Republic, and clamoring to replace the Republic with mobocracy democracy, the

A useful comparison of Ron Paul's stunning economic conservative record.  RP is easily the most conservative candidate in the repubican primary.  Where RP differs from his comparatively liberal-socialist challengers (Santorum, Gingrich and Romney), is on social conservative values.  Simply put, the Constitution prohibits the Federal government from forcing into law the both social conservative "values" and socialist -liberal democrat "values".  Easy enough. At the State level, and with the blessing of the 9th and 10th Amendments, conservatives and socialist can have at it; as long as they don't cross the Bill of Rights barriers.  Federally, i'm a strict constitutionalist - which means libertarian. Good read, but the author does not go into foreign policy, where the strict Constitutionalist Libertarian clashes with both the militant social conservatives, and the nation building - human rights happy socialists. Sure would like to see a civil discussion of how those waging civil war in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Libya and the Congo (among other places :( ) are a direct threat to USA citizens.  If they are, then Congress needs to stand by the Constitution and declare WAR.  And do so before committing funds for these militarist - corporatist - bankster ventures.

Unfunded liabilities are the difference between a program's projected costs and its projected revenues, both valued in today's dollars. Medicare and Social Security both have promised benefits that outrace revenue streams. They are the largest components of the government's unfunded liabilities, the hidden debt of the nation. But there are other federal retirement programs with not merely inadequate funding like Medicare and Social Security, but with no revenue streams of their own at all. Among them are retirement programs for military and federal workers. In September 2011, USA Today analyzed dozens of overlapping programs for retired federal workers. It reported that despite the existing debt crisis, Congress continues to add to the promised benefits, so that retirement programs now have a $5.7 trillion unfunded liability. The newspaper sums up its report on the retirement programs this way: Private employers are legally required to put money into pension funds to match retirement promises. Private pensions have $2.3 trillion in stocks, bonds, real estate and other assets. State and local governments have $3 trillion in retirement funds. The federal government has nothing set aside. The total unfunded liabilities of the U.S. government have been calculated with a number of present value and discount models. Results of the shortfall from these methods range from about $70 trillion to $120 trillion dollars. For a family of four this represents a liability between $900,000 and $1.5 million. (You can follow the debt as it adds up at www.USdebt.org.)

Excellent commentary.  Nails it, big time.  But for sure this is not good news for Americans concerned about the future of Liberty and the US Constitution.  For patriots this is A Must Read! excerpt: We had been invited to watch the State of the Union address with a group of dinosaurs…a group approaching extinction with dignity and intelligence. You might call them 'thinking conservatives,' 'paleo-conservatives' or 'constitutionalists.' Whatever they were, they were not like the scoundrels currently running for the Republican nomination or the yahoos who vote for them. They were more like a renegade, retrograde group…like a secret society of White Russian intellectuals after the Revolution of 1917. They cling to hope…that the nation will come to its senses…that the constitution will again be honored…and that the old republic, established by the founding fathers, will be resurrected… …they will hang on to their hope…until they are hanged by a rope. "What do you mean?" "I mean…it is on the road to hell… This isn't just about losing money. Heck, the US is going broke. But you can go broke with honor. Good people go broke. Smart people go broke. Dumb people go broke. You can't go to hell with honor. Bad people go to hell."

A comprehensive list of OBAMA'S CZARS, complete with mug shot, name, radical affiliations and background info, and the commisar's position, and description of subjugation and control task. Truly a rogues gallery of those responsible for paving the road to Tyranny. Fun question: how many of these trough sucking scumdogs are Constitutionally approved? excerpt: There are very few of us who know just what all of Obama's Czars do, as they quietly go about their "work" in the nation's capital. This listing of their names and job descriptions should be educational to all Americans, no matter what your political leaning. If you resent the existence of these extra-governmental "officials", with their very generous salaries funded by, you guessed it, you the taxpayer, then get angry with the one who put these characters on the payroll. See who they are and realize what they want to do:

As many know, i spent quite a bit of time working for a Chinese Company seeking to enter the USA-European software market.  My task was to research the market, discover and define a market opportunity, design the product, and then work as product manager to get that service to market.  I took this job to better understand the Chinese marketplace and how sovereign Chinese companies work.  What i learned is how the Chinese seek to exploit and totally dominate open markets.  Software is just a category whose time has come.  and there are thousands of Chinese companies lining up.  The first step though is to fine tune the existing blueprint used by other Sina sovereigns.  amazing stuff. My take away from this experience is that the USA MUST set up a 30% tariff on ALL imports, and do so IMMEDIATELY!!!  Yesterday is not soon enough! As a newly minted libertarian, i wondered about the obvious conflict with Austrian Economics and their dedication to free markets and free trade?  I found the answer at this Libertarian forum, where many members were in heated discussion.  Comment #7 sums it up best i think.  Including a link to Ron Paul's Tariff-NAFTA speech. The thing is, the 30% Tariff should be part of an overall TAX REDUCTION PLAN.  I support the FAIR TAX and the Balanced Budget Amendment.  As an alternative to the Fair Tax, I would also support a 17% flat tax with no exceptions.  The ideal situation being an immediate, uncompromising, no exceptions 30% tariff on ALL imports coupled with the Fair Tax and the Balanced Budget Amendment.   And yes, i do believe this plan is consistent with the Founding Fathers Constitution.  But it took some kind of research to establish that opinion.   I've also concluded that "conservatism" is a convenient philosophical vehicle for the corrupt crony corporatism of both the military-industrial-complex, banksters and, international corporations.  Free trade and open markets concepts are perverted to become a thin veil

Excellent hit list of all those issues and activities Obama needs Americans to forget if he's to get re elected.   He can't run on his Carteresque record so he's going to run on rhetoric backed by Big Bankster bucks, Big Union muscle,  Big Crony Corporatist, and the power of a corrupt Big Media.  So what else is new?   Very helpful list.  

Excellent story on George Soros, the epitome of evil.  The man who seeks to destroy America and the ideals of individual liberty and natural rights.  Of course, Soros claims to be anything but the evil Bankster who backs Obama and international ruling elites seeking to take out the American Constitution, and replace it with a socialist-militarist-corporatist governance under the command and control of international Banksters. One thing not covered in this story is how the reptillion Soros rose within the ranks of the Bankster illuminati?  Who staked his 1972 hedge fund innovation?  Who helped him escape first National Socialism, and then International Socialism, to become the primary mover of a new International socialism run by international Banksters?  excerpt: To many, the idea of Soros lecturing the world on "evil" is, well, rich. Here, after all, is an investor who proved-and profited hugely from-the now much-derided notion that the market, or in his case a single investor, is more powerful than sovereign governments. He broke the Bank of England, destroyed the Conservative Party's reputation for economic competence, and reduced the value of the pound in British consumers' pockets by one fifth in a single day. Soros the currency speculator has been condemned as "unnecessary, unproductive, immoral." Mahathir Mohamad, former prime minister of Malaysia, once called him "criminal" and "a moron." In the U.S., where the right still has not forgiven him for agitating against President George W. Bush and the "war on terror" after 9/11, which he described as "pernicious," his prediction of riots on the streets-"it's already started," he says-will likely spark fresh criticism that Soros is a "far-left, radical bomb thrower," as Bill O'Reilly once put it. Critics already allege he is stoking the fires by funding the Occupy movement through Adbusters, the Canadian provocateurs who sparked the movement. Not so, says So

Ali Soufan is a Lebanese-American FBI agent who was involved in a number of high-profile anti-terrorism cases both in the United States and around the world. A New Yorker article in 2006 described Soufan as coming closer than anyone to preventing the September 11 attacks, even implying that he would have succeeded had the CIA been willing to share information with him. He retired from the FBI in 2005 after publicly chastising the CIA for not sharing information with him which could have prevented the attacks. He is the CEO of the Soufan Group.

Nice grab by Marbux.   The old maxim holds true and is more important today than ever before: "Don't listen to what they say.  Watch carefully what they do!" excerpt: We've already made our choice for the best headline of the year, so far: "Citigroup Replaces JPMorgan as White House Chief of Staff." When we saw it on the website Gawker.com we had to smile - but the smile didn't last long. There's simply too much truth in that headline; it says a lot about how Wall Street and Washington have colluded to create the winner-take-all economy that rewards the very few at the expense of everyone else. The story behind it is that Jack Lew is President Obama's new chief of staff - arguably the most powerful office in the White House that isn't shaped like an oval. He used to work for the giant banking conglomerate Citigroup. His predecessor as chief of staff is Bill Daley, who used to work at the giant banking conglomerate JPMorgan Chase, where he was maestro of the bank's global lobbying and chief liaison to the White House. Daley replaced Obama's first chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, who once worked as a rainmaker for the investment bank now known as Wasserstein & Company, where in less than three years he was paid a reported eighteen and a half million dollars. The new guy, Jack Lew - said by those who know to be a skilled and principled public servant - ran hedge funds and private equity at Citigroup, which means he's a member of the Wall Street gang, too. His last job was as head of President Obama's Office of Management and Budget, where he replaced Peter Orzag, who now works as vice chairman for global banking at - hold on to your deposit slip - Citigroup. Still with us? It's startling the number of high-ranking Obama officials who have spun through the revolving door between the White House and the sacred halls of investment banking.

Constitutional legal scholar Jonathan Turley examines the unconstitutional changes the Federal government has instituted since 911.  Chilling stuff.  Here is the short list: .. Assassination of US Citizens .. Arbitrary Justice .. Warrantless Searches .. Secret evidence .. Secret courts .. War crimes (violations of the Nuremberg principles of International Law) .. Immunity from judicial review ..Continual (and warrantless) monitoring of citizens .. Extraordinary renditions Turley asks how can we continue to consider America the land of the free when the Federal government continues to compromise our freedoms on a scale only seen in despotic military tyrannies?  Like China, Cuba and Pakistan?   I've been following the post and comments of the Bay Area Patriot group, a local Tea Party offshoot.  It's incredible how so many members continue to be swept up in 911 mania, demanding more military actions in more places.  As if the ten years of war in Afghansitan and Iraq have left our country safe in our way of life and secure in our freedoms.  Just the opposite is happening, as Professor Turley so thoroughly details.  Yet, they cry for more war.  Then proudly claim their status as Tea Party Patriots taking action to restore America and USA Constitution.   What was Einstein's definition of insanity?  :) excerpt: The column addresses how the continued rollbacks on civil liberties in the United States conflicts with the view of the country as the land of the free.  If we are going to adopt Chinese legal principles, we should at least have the integrity to adopt one Chinese proverb: "The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names."  We seem as a country to be in denial as to the implications of these laws and policies.  Whether we are viewed as a free country with authoritarian inclinations or an authoritarian nation with free aspirations (or some other hybrid definition), we are clearly not what we once were.

Stunning story.  Looks like the marxist int eh White House is going after Apple and the Communist dictators in Beijing.  How did things get so upside down? excerpt: Today, few are. Almost all of the 70 million iPhones, 30 million iPads and 59 million other products Apple sold last year were manufactured overseas. Why can't that work come home? Mr. Obama asked. Mr. Jobs's reply was unambiguous. "Those jobs aren't coming back," he said, according to another dinner guest. The president's question touched upon a central conviction at Apple. It isn't just that workers are cheaper abroad. Rather, Apple's executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that "Made in the U.S.A." is no longer a viable option for most Apple products.

The Solyndras are coming!  The Solyndras are coming!  Thanks to Republican congressman Darryl Issa, California, and his investigation into the Obama Energy Department, we now know that Obama has funneled $6.5 BILLION in taxpayer money into a growing collection of Solyndras.   The Solyndras are turning out to be bankrupt green energy companies headed by wealthy investors actively bundling and raising campaign finance funds for Obama.  Ex: Solyndra investor George Kaiser raised over $100,000 for Obama's election campaign, and got a kick back / bankruptcy bailout of over a half Billion Dollars from the Energy Department.  Not enough to save the already failed Solyndra, but enough to make the bundlers and fund raisers whole.  Lesser shareholders and over a thousand employees took the hit. Thanks to Rep Issa, we now know that the Obama - Solyndra scam was actually a formula for transforming (moving) taxpayer funds into private bundler investments.  Awful stuff.  Corruption on steroids in that the Energy Department knew far in advance of the bankruptcy filings that these companies were going down.  Yet the bailout funds were still approved.  Also note that Obama bundlers, banksters, and financiers have open access to the White House.  The visitor log is itself an explosive indictment of the corrosive crony socialism - banksterism that has become the hallmark of the Obama regime. Most of the money for the Solyndras comes out of the failed $1 Trillion Obamulous bill passed by his socialist party early on his administration - February of 2009.

Awful stuff. We are no longer a republic. This is fascism.

A CBS News report has discovered 12 Clean Energy Firms that Received $6.5B in Taxpayer Money.  All are in Solyndra bankruptcy lsimilar Financial Trouble.  It gets worse.  The CBS News investigation found a clear pattern of the government pouring your tax dollars into clean energy projects wretched with crony democratic party political ties.  It's payback time for the Obama campaign finance bundlers.  This isn't clean energy.  This is the taxpayers getting cleaned by Obama and his corporatist supporters.  Awful, disgusting stuff.  At least Mitt Romney and Bain Capital used their own money. excerpt: Solar panel maker Solyndra received a $528 million Energy Department loan in 2009 - and  went bankrupt last year. The government's risky investment strategy didn't stop there, as a CBS News investigation has uncovered a pattern of cases of the government pouring your tax dollars into clean energy.

Libertarian Ron Paul argues that Obama isn't a socialist.  He's a corporatist.  Not sure i agree with that assessment.  Obammunism is turning out to be government-by-Banksters, where DEBT is racked up through massive socialist, corporatist, and militarist spending.  The current generation pays the INTEREST only, leaving future generations with massive escalating systemic debt and interest payments.  It's the combination of socialism, corporatism and militarism that makes Obammunism unique, and the Banksters who back it so happy........ The one thing Obammunism is not is "Constitutional". excerpt: Socialism is a system where the government directly owns and manages businesses. Corporatism is a system where businesses are nominally in private hands, but are in fact controlled by the government. In a corporatist state, government officials often act in collusion with their favored business interests to design polices that give those interests a monopoly position, to the detriment of both competitors and consumers.

excerpt: This is the Appendix to Ron Paul's new book, Liberty Defined. Rights belong to individuals, not groups; they derive from our nature and can neither be granted nor taken away by government. All peaceful, voluntary economic and social associations are permitted; consent is the basis of the social and economic order. Justly acquired property is privately owned by individuals and voluntary groups, and this ownership cannot be arbitrarily voided by governments. Government may not redistribute private wealth or grant special privileges to any individual or group. Individuals are responsible for their own actions; government cannot and should not protect us from ourselves. Government may not claim the monopoly over a people's money and governments must never engage in official counterfeiting, even in the name of macroeconomic stability. Aggressive wars, even when called preventative, and even when they pertain only to trade relations, are forbidden. Jury nullification, that is, the right of jurors to judge the law as well as the facts, is a right of the people and the courtroom norm. All forms of involuntary servitude are prohibited, not only slavery but also conscription, forced association, and forced welfare distribution. Government must obey the law that it expects other people to obey and thereby must never use force to mold behavior, manipulate social outcomes, manage the economy, or tell other countries how to behave.